Fire to Ash
by ashurahime
Summary: She walked along the road. Lampposts cast shifting shadows. Even if you close your eyes, the world is a dark place. In the midst of the forest's impregnable darkness, a small flicker of light.


Evening came earlier than she had expected. The sky was dark, a bumpy warm blanket of black. To her left, an imposing wall of trees hovered over her. The deep green pines scraped the sky, each trunk and branch like rusted needles intruding from the womb of the earth. It was another stifling summer's night, and Orihime was on her way home.

"Mary had a little lamb," she sang softly, just the smallest of bounces in her step. The lampposts casted shifting shadows that bit at her ankles and extended a long ways behind her.

"Little lamb, little lamb…" Orihime, her smile as unrestrained as that of a child of ten, continued along down the long lonely road. No soul walked this road at night. The lampposts were few and far between on this forest-side path. But it was the most direct route home.

"Mary had a little lamb," Orihime sang, even as a light caught her eye from within the depths of the dark forest. With curious, innocent eyes, she turned towards the wood and heard a sound. "Whose fleece was white as snow…"

She strained her hearing, and sure enough she heard it again. The mewl of a cat. Brow furrowed in worry and lip pouted, Orihime set off into the forest without hesitation.

The terrain was for the most part flat, although the underbrush was thick. It was difficult for Orihime to manoeuvre through the untamed wilderness, but she continued to follow the sounds soft in the darkness. Soon, the lights from the road could no longer reach where she was, and she was forced to move much more slowly through the forest. There was mud on her shoes, and the raindrops on the leaves and shrubs caught onto her clothes. She stubbed her toes on rocks and stumbled over roots, but she persisted with conviction.

The sound of the mewls grew louder. Orihime could now distinguish that there was more than one cat out there in the wood. It sounded like there might be several. The girl wondered what all of these cats might be doing there together this night. She became nervous as she began to question whether or not she had enough milk at home to feed them all.

Soon, the girl learnt what had caught her eye. There was a light up ahead, a very small light, in the same place where she heard the cats' mewls coming from. Perhaps the cats were being taken for a stroll? With renewed vigour and optimism, Orihime moved onwards towards the light and the cats.

Soon, the light flickered off again, hidden by the underbrush. What replaced it was a hitting sound, like someone was beating the earth. As she approached, Orihime recognized what she heard as shovelling, and continued on towards the sound. When she didn't hear the sound from the shovel she heard the mewls, and they guided her forward through the wood.

She reached her destination more quickly than she had expected. In a moment, she had stumbled onto the scene, the lantern at rest on the ground illuminating her surroundings.

There was a man, very thin and very pale, dressed entirely in black and crouched over a small cardboard box. To the man's right was a discarded shovel and a hole. From where she stood, Orihime saw in the man's cocaine-white hands a kitten, with fur golden in the flaming light of the lantern and eyes as blue as the sky of a clear spring dawn. The man carefully lowered the mewling kitten into the box, where it joined what sounded like many others.

"What are you doing, mister," Orihime asked, slightly confused by the situation.

The man looked over his shoulder, not seeming the least bit surprised that she was there. He stared at Orihime with eyes a more striking green than anything the girl could have thought possible. Wordlessly, slowly, the man closed the cardboard box.

"What are you doing," Orihime repeated, anxious now.

The man responded only by taking the box filled with mewling kittens into his hands and placing it gently into the rather deep hole. The box was a snug fit, but the man was satisfied. The fire flickered erratically. Orihime followed it all with her eyes, frozen in shock.

"Stop it," she said, as the man reached for his shovel. "Stop it, I said," the girl demanded. She neared the man, ready to take the shovel away, but the man wouldn't have it. His bony-white hands' grip on the instrument was strong as he started piling the earth back into the hole, burying the kittens alive.

"No, you can't," Orihime whispered, too terrified to muster a cry, too terrified to awaken the dead all around her. She reached for the box that was quickly being buried by the large shovelfuls. The man's pace never changed; he was slow, meticulous, careful, and unrelenting. The kittens continued to mewl. The flame shook in the night gust. The man allowed the girl for a while to claw away at the dirt, but he was becoming frustrated. The man's skeletal fingers wrapped around Orihime's wrist.

"Go sit over there," the man intoned, motioning with his head towards a nearby rock. He saw the defiance in the girl's eyes, but also the deep and penetrating fear that stole from her the ability to raise her voice in protest. "You are going to watch. And then we will decide what to do with you."

The man's grip on the girl's wrists tightened painfully before he let her go. As he expected, she retreated to the rock just a few feet behind him, tears streaming freely down her face.

"Please," she implored, as the man continued to shovel. "Please…" But her cry fell on deaf ears. The man filled the hole, and patted it flat and firm. His expression was completely unreadable. She could still hear the muffled mewls of the little kittens.

The man stood before the grave for a few moments before finally turning his attention towards Orihime. She sat huddled between a rock and a tree, surrounded by the underbrush. The man stood over her, unmoving. The flaming light of the lantern casted his face into shadow and shone a brilliant fiery orange through the man's dark hair. His eyes shone forest green, glowing like the eyes of a snake in the darkness. The desperate mewling continued.

"You fancy yourself a hero, little girl," the man asked, his tone offering no judgment, only the simple statement of observation. Orihime couldn't speak. At the end of a long interlude filled only with mewling and the girl's silent prayers, the kittens' mewling could no longer be heard. Fresh tears streamed from the girl's eyes.

"Everything around you is rotting. There is never enough for everyone," the man said, voice slow and calm and completely rational. The natural firelight flickered. A water droplet fell onto her forehead. The silence weighed heavily as the man took out a dagger.

"Even if you close your eyes, this is reality. I am everyone you have ever met," the man's low voice said as he came down on one knee before the girl. His eyes met hers, but the pure intensity of it forced the girl to drop her gaze to her lap. She felt his hand on her waist.

"Hold your breath," the man said. The girl complied, every fibre of her being wishing for a miracle. The man held the hem of her shirt and lifted the fabric up over her head. The girl stiffened as she stood at attention before the man, forced still by the gleaming silver dagger he held threateningly in his other hand.

"Please," the girl whispered. "Please…"

The girl's shirt removed, the man placed his dagger on the floor behind him and moved on to her bra. His arms went around her and unlatched it. "Don't move," the man whispered. "You're in my world now." Silent tears continued to flow.

The man's hands then moved to her skirt. He undid the zipper and slowly pulled the cloth down over her hips, his hands lingering over the exposed skin. As he lowered the skirt down Orihime's legs, he absently ran his fingers over her, as if in admiration. He shook himself from his daze and piled her skirt with the shirt and bra already on the ground. The girl could only cry in silence, petrified that she might incur his wrath.

The skirt removed, the pale murderer's skeletal hands then traveled back up over Orihime's legs, up her thighs in deliberate motions. His eyes, although staring intently, revealed no emotion. The flame flickered tauntingly. The man took hold of the girl's panties on each side, and slowly brought them down to her ankles.

"Please," Orihime breathed, her body contracted in pure terror. She tried to close her legs, but the man was faster. His hand came over her womanhood, his long bony fingers poking around hungrily. The girl brought her hands over his and tried to force him off, but this only encouraged the man. He made her squirm and gasp in horror beneath his touch. The girl wanted to disappear.

When the man had had his fun, he took the girl roughly by the wrist and tossed her in a heap over to where he had buried the kittens alive. She looked up at him in raw fear. The man took his shovel, took his lantern, took her clothes and walked away without a word or a look back.

"Please," she called out, despite herself. "I need those."

The man's eyes raked over the naked girl's form from over his shoulder. Then his overpowering gaze pierced through her wide, terror-stricken eyes. "So do I." The man walked away, the light retreating father and father into the darkness. Orihime was happy to see the flame gone.

The girl didn't move. Her head was just a foot or so above the lifeless cadavers of murdered kittens; her legs were sprawled carelessly around her. The girl's eyes, clear and sharp, watched as her finger drew circles in the dirt.

"Mary had a little lamb… whose fleece was white as ash…"


End file.
